Communication cables and in particular data cables used for the transmission of information according to the Ethernet standard are commonplace and used in a multitude of environments including commercial offices and buildings, industrial environments, and with increasing frequency, residences.
Commonly used cables often include twisted wire pairs. Furthermore, a data cable may contain two connectors on both ends to connect a computer or network device. A type of cable connector being used with increasing frequency in residences and small businesses is generally referred to as RJ-45 connector, RJ stands for registered jack. They were originally invented and patented by Bell Telephone Laboratories (patent filed 6 Jul. 1973; U.S. Pat. No. 3,860,316 issued 14 Jan. 1975), and replaced the hard-wired connections on most Western Electric telephones around 1976. Thus, they are also sometimes called Western jacks and Western plugs.
However, RJ-type connectors suffer from a few limitations. For example, the common locking tab of a typical RJ-type makes insertion and removal from the terminal jack difficult. Moreover, durability is a problem because of breakage from use and common incidents whereby the tab gets caught or snagged on other cables or foreign objects. Still further, common connectors may suffer from faulty terminal connections. Therefore, there is a need for a cable connector to inter alia, overcome the above mentioned shortcomings.